3 posts tagged “christmas”
I think my innocent heart will never be the same.
I should have seen this coming though. I mean children's toys that promote learning have been evolving over the years from those early young scientist test tube chem labs and on into the goo factories, but how far is too far?
Really.
I jut got the mail and of course since Christmas is SOFRAKINCLOSETIMETOPANICOMGOMGOMG!!! oops sorry bout that, anyway since Christmas is so close of course our daily mail delivery includes at least one if not more of the newest trend in child gift marketing, the educational toy catalog.
Today's edition: Museum Tour. www.museumtour.com
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not totally knocking these things. I mean while most of the stuff is cheaply made but isn't cheap to buy, there is once in a while something worthwhile.
THIS is not one of those things.
Well ok, if you're really fanatical about making sure your 8 yr old gets accepted into THE BEST schools maybe it is one of those things. But I'm not so it isn't.
Yes, a book about owl puke. COMPLETE WITH 4 ACTUAL OWL PELLETS FOR YOUR CHILD TO DISSECT!
GUARANTEED TO CONTAIN THE BONES OF SOMETHING THE OWL ATE!!
Granted the publishers (?) claim that the pellets are heat treated to be sterilized and "safe" but EWWW!!!
Here's the product description:
Pick Apart (and Put Back Together) What the Owl Ate for Dinner
Barn owls swallow and digest whole small rodents, then cough up the undigested parts in an odorless lump called a pellet. These pellets offer a fun and fascinating anatomy lesson for junior biologists. You'll pick out the skeletal remains from the foil-covered pellet, then assemble them into a form that can be identified using the bone chart and illustrations in Owl Puke, the 96-page book that is a hoot to read.
Kit comes with 4 pellets and a bone tray. Ideal for kids' parties and scouting clubs.
Extend the fun and learning with extra pellets.
Ages 8-12
5074 - Owl Puke Book and 4 Pellets - $29.95
Oh I just noticed one of their selling points is that it's ideal for kids' parties!!! ZOMG!
You know nothing says good parenting like having a birthday party where the guests get to play with owl puke!
EDIT: Durh, didn't even think of it as being an appropriate science activity for homeschoolers. Thanks to Lauowolf for the thought! :-)
LOL I just thumbed through the catalog some more and found this!!
Now your child can live the dream of roleplaying as an airport security guard!!!
http://www.museumtour.com/product/3207/
Oh
My
Gawd! "Scan your friends for fun"...the possibilities!
Now this, this genius idea I could get behind. Teach your child to massage your feet the right way.
http://www.museumtour.com/product/2745/
With apologies to the original authors of It's Beginning To Look a Lot Like Christmas.
IT'S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE A FUNNY CHRISTMAS
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas In the Cubicle. Take a look at the keyboard and mouse Wrapped up so swell. All that’s missing is A bow! It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas In the Cubicle. Take a friend and have some fun Wrapping everything you can Just don’t forget the trash bin. It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas Soon the laughter will start. And the thing that makes me grin Is the practical joke that begins Right here at work! After wrapping the gifts for the children our office had adopted from the angel tree, we had some leftover paper and some free time on our hands at the end of the day. On a lark I suggested we wrap the entrance way to another co worker's cubicle after he'd left for the day. Co worker #1 suggested we take it even further and wrap everything inside his cubicle as well. I haven't played a practical joke on anyone (as an adult) before. OMG this was SO much fun! We totally got into the spirit of it too. Playing Christmas carols and singing along while we wrapped. (that's what inspired my version of the song above.) Unfortunately we ran out of paper otherwise we would have wrapped EVERYTHING! We weren't there the next morning when he arrived so we missed his reaction. Although the balls of wrapping paper piled pyramid style on my keyboard in front of my monitor gave me a clue. Someone else told us that he pulled them into the office laughing so hard and saying, "Lookit! Lookit what they did!" So now although I enter the office each day leery of what fate awaits me in retribution I have two thngs to say, 1) I have no regrets and 2) It was worth it. :-D Merry Christmas!
Directions: Change all the answers so they apply to you. Then, send this to a whole bunch of people you know, INCLUDING the person who sent it to you.
It's the season to be cheerful!!!
- Wrapping paper or gift bags? Gift bags if I have to do it myself, wrapping paper if I can bribe someone ("Oh Honeeeeeee?") to do it for me. Why? Because I suck at wrapping. Never learned the knack despite repeated attempts by those with teh wrapping gene to pass it on to me. Even my 5 yr old son wraps better than I do. The long standing, obvious family joke is that it isn't necessary to put my name on the "from" part of the tag the wrapping job speaks for itself. :-P
- Real tree or artificial? Has to be artificial due to allergies,but I do so love the smell of real. But I have many a fond memory of the exploding Christmas tree every year. At my house we kept the Christmas tree up in the attic. The attic door was very narrow as were the stairs. So narrow that the box when it was full of Christmas tree parts wouldn't fit through it. I assume they broke it down the first time it went up there. :-) So every year at Christmas time, Dad would be in the attic at the box, Mom a little farther down nearer to the door, and my brother and I would run back and forth from her taking branches and throwing them down the stairs. By the time all the pieces were down it looked as if someone had blown up a Christmas tree in our dining room. Then we had the fun of sorting the branches by the color coding on the tips of the wires while Dad fiddled with the base and "trunk". We had that tree for so many years that eventually the colors wore off and Dad had to paint new ones on.
- When do you put up the tree? It has never been on any set schedule. Growing up it was usually by the week after Thanksgiving. Now with my own family it seems to vary year by year. December is usually a very busy month for us because my Daughter's birthday is in the 2nd week and we usually do something special for her. If we're having a party at home we'll have the tree up. This year we're so busy every weekend that it probably won't get done until about a week and a half before Christmas.
- When do you take the tree down? Again, it varies. Growing up, since Mom's birthday is January 1st we usually kept it up until at least the week after New Years. Now we seem to get it down sometimes even before New Years, usually because it takes up so much valuable space in our house. Space better served for growing kids to be running around and playing in. Plus we usually have to move some of the living room furniture into other rooms to make room for it and the crowded feeling tends to get us motivated to take it down sooner.
- Do you like eggnog? Yes! YES! A thousand times YES! I have always LOVED eggnog. I am the only one in my family who does, both when I was a kid and now with my own. :-9 Let me just say I think I frightened a few shoppers in the dairy aisle last year when I discovered Lactaid makes Eggnog!
- Favorite gift received as a child? I still remember this one. I was about 4 or 5 maybe. I'd spied a kitchen set. One of those 70's all in one particle board kind. Mom had hidden it in the attic and by mistake left the door ajar one evening as I was heading to bed. I saw it and got SO excited. Mom covered pretty good. She told me, "Oh that's for your Cousin Jennifer, we're just hiding it here for her Mommy and Daddy." I bought it. Never mind that my cousin was an infant not even crawling yet and her family was in Germany where my Uncle was stationed in the Army. Christmas morning I came down the stairs and there it was with a (I kid you not!) beam of sunlight from the window shining down on it like a beacon. I think I screamed. I was so thrilled that Santa had heard my wishes and had gotten me a kitchen set just like my cousin's. :-D
- Do you have a nativity scene? No. I think my Mom got a Precious Moments one when I was older, but I don't really recall one. No wait, I take it back. Mom made a set I think in her Ceramics class one year. But now I don't have one. We do have a sort of Christmas Village courtesy of my Mom who started us off with a gift of a fiber optic Christmas House from Avon. She's added to it for us with other pieces and we've supplemented with various Christmas knicknacks of my Mother In Law's.
- Hardest person to buy for? My husband. Because everything he wants he gets himself and when I ask him what he wants I get a lot of hemming and hawwing... I try though. I love to get that perfect gift that makes someone go "OMG WOW!" He doesn't do that for anything I've ever gotten him except for one game, Dungeon Keeper. Even then he was like, "Um ok, I suppose I'll try it." But once he tried it, thinking he'd be bored or hate it he ended up loving it.
- Easiest person to buy for? Everyone else, I just tend to see things, or think of things and say to myself, "So and So would LOVE this." and I am usually right. Specifically, my daughter is so pie in the sky easy right now. Anything related to High School Musical and Barbie, and glamour, and electronics, and music, and and and...
- Worst Christmas gift ever received? A DVD set of the Planet of The Apes Movies. Ugh. I apologize to anyone who might like those movies. But I have never EVER liked them at all. Husband heard me telling someone this once and when shopping he forgot every movie I have ever told him I did like or would want to have and remembered me saying something about the Planet of The Apes. So he bought Planet of The Apes. I suppose I should be grateful he remembered anything I said. :-P
- Mail or email Christmas card? Except for a select few this year neither. I tend to focus more on gift giving, phone calls, and personal letters. I never really liked the concept of "well so and so sent me a card last year so I HAVE to send them a card this year, and such and such didn't send us a card this year so they're off the list. Nope not me, if I want to send someone a card it is because I saw a card or made one myself that reflects my feelings for them.
- Favorite Christmas movie? White Christmas. Critics may abound that it is a cheesy movie, lame plotline, rehashing of other movies, but this movie has 2 redeeming qualities for me. Danny Kaye singing and dancing, and Danny Kaye acting. :-) Even just writing the name of the movie starts the soundtrack in my mind. And I don't really hear "White Christmas" I hear, "Choreography", "Best Things Happen While You're Dancing" and "Sisters".
- When do you start shopping for Christmas? Whenever I see something right for someone. Major shopping tends to start the middle of November and goes right up to Christmas. Mostly because we have to get gifts for my Daughter's birthday and decide which ones she'll get for that and which ones for Christmas.
- Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Yes, the year my Grandma gave me a mint green sweater I hated. It was so not my color. I gave it to my Mom, but not technically recycled since she was there when I unwrapped it.
- Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? Christmas Sugar cookies. with icing. The only time I seem to enjoy cookies with icing on them.
- Clear lights or colored on the tree? Colored, and blinking. A bone of contention in our house. I like them to blink, others can't stand it. I set to blink, come by later and they're solid. Change back, and back and back. It is almost becoming a secret war betwixt us.
- Favorite Christmas song? Winter Wonderland and Jolly Old St. Nicholas. (the old non politically correct version not this one.
- Travel at Christmas or stay at home? I would love to go home to Michigan for Christmas one year, but for now we stay home and go to the next town over Christmas day for dinner at my Husband's Grandparents.
- Can you name Santa's reindeer? Sure, let's see, this guy looks like he should be called Cinder, that one she's Grace, over there is Flitter, oh and she's definatly a Crystal, here's Poe, and Nigel, and Elly, and last but not least Cocoa. What?!?
- Do you have an angel on top or a star? We've gone back and forth between an old star and an angel until we finally found the beauty that resides on our tree now.
- Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? Usually only open on Christmas morning, but this year we might start letting the kids open the ones from my parents the night before. Mostly so they can fully appreciate those gifts and they won't get "lost" in the shuffle of Santa's gifts etc...
- Most annoying thing about this time of year? The radio stations that play NOTHING but Christmas songs from sometimes before Thanksgiving to New Year's day. WTF? I love a good Christmas Carol but I am SO SO tired of the same songs over and over and over...
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